


as i lay dying

by pyrrhlc



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Barricade Day, M/M, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-05
Updated: 2020-06-05
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:08:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24513604
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pyrrhlc/pseuds/pyrrhlc
Summary: Grantaire opens his mouth to issue a retort, stops. He doesn’t know how to sayI have watched you dieany more thanI don’t know how to stay away from you. Both statements would hurt equally, and have the same amount of truth to them. Instead, Grantaire gives an angry shrug of his shoulders and turns away.One rainy night after a meeting, Enjolras and Grantaire have an argument.
Relationships: Enjolras/Grantaire
Comments: 12
Kudos: 108





	as i lay dying

**Author's Note:**

> cw for minor references to violence, blood and grantaire's general whole perception of self / lack of self worth etc

They have gotten rather good at this, Grantaire thinks. Not saying what they mean, even when it’s important. Even when he should, absolutely, tell Enjolras what he’s thinking.

But they continue to dance around the unspoken regardless, even in the most frightening of times, even when absolutely everything seems rotten, bound to fall apart.

It’s the same tonight. Grantaire can’t decide whether they are friends or not friends, what shouting at each other just a little less, with just a little less vitriol, really means. All he knows is that he feels exceptionally drunk and Enjolras is running after him, chasing him down the street like he might lose him, even despite the fact that Grantaire is walking at a pace anyone else would consider a crawl.

Half of the time his balance is there and half of the time it isn’t. He’s clutching at straws and the building beside him and his mind is too full of something else to think clearly, but these aren’t new sensations as far as Grantaire is concerned. He has felt this way before – in this life and others.

He misses with an acute pang of longing in his chest the time when that was not a metaphor. Two hundred years and however many lives blunted from his memory either because he wasn’t there or died quickly, and he was probably a fuck up in all of them.

But this is the first time of all those times when the man who he thinks he loves chooses to chase him down. Perhaps to slap him across the face. For what he said in the meeting tonight, Grantaire probably deserves it.

“Grantaire!”

More sights, curdled sounds and scenes of colour that don’t make sense. He should never have come here tonight. Should never have allowed Éponine to convince him otherwise, that he might be useful, a helpful spot of scepticism that casts a shadow over idealism foolish and prone enough to land them all in trouble.

None of these things have ever been true. He will always end up drunk, and he and Enjolras will always end up in a fight. This is just another one of those immutable laws that make up the universe, he thinks. Something that will remain the same no matter the era, no matter if what sits on the tables around them is new or old, lamps or harsh electric light or even nothing at all.

Grantaire’s shoulders could not carry the burden of one wretched life, let alone many, and he doesn’t wish another rehash of that life tonight, another flickering scene to add to the memory of so many other arguments, so many other burdens.

Enjolras, he thinks, in a slightly sadder, quieter voice, does not deserve it either. He has carried the world on his back for almost two hundred years now and cravat or soft woollen jumper Grantaire has no desire to make him aware of it – to see the burden of infinite loss, the push and pull of so many tides of human suffering as inevitable, as Grantaire has begun to.

How to explain, he thinks, that he walks into their meetings full of scepticism and scathing despair against his own will? How to un-know a friend’s death, and not have to look them in the eye and think of a bayonet sliding between their ribs every time they speak of boxing, the soft breaks in between the hardships? Victories come slow and not without their own share of sacrifices – this is something Grantaire knows.

But to hear Enjolras talk so easily of causes and knowing how it ended then … That is the difficult part, he thinks, to simply stand back and watch Enjolras walk himself towards his own destruction, aided by a furious and righteous anger that never burns out. This is but one of the many reasons he cannot, will not, turn around and look him in the eye as Enjolras calls his name.

That he is beautiful and has always been so does not enter into this equation, but it weighs on his mind like it always does, and his heart grows heavier with every footstep. Until it hangs like a weight around his neck, unsteady and cloying as the sweet scent of blood he smells every time he comes within a foot of the man behind him, and the force of his presence can be ignored no more.

He is ready for when Enjolras grabs him by the shoulder, though the degree of gentleness in the action surprises him. He isn’t sure when Enjolras stopped yelling his name or the world stopped spinning to such a horrible degree, or even the moment he stopped walking, but he throws off the hand before turning to look at him, just to be sure.

Just to make it clear, he thinks, that they are not friends and never will be. Not when Grantaire is such an outrageous fuck up himself.

He still has to brace himself against those eyes, piercing blue and almost white, at odds with the rest of his complexion, sandy skin and tawny lion hair making him look something fearsome even when he isn’t trying. He’s been trying since they met, twenty-two and already knowing far too much about the things they have lost before, not to meet Enjolras’ eyes.

The fingers of his left hand itch every time and he cannot stop remembering the way it had felt, both their lives snuffed out together, Enjolras’ eyes slipping closed just a moment before his. He had been just as drunk then as he is now, but no one is going to die tonight, save for disappearing in the dark of night and never coming home again. And he may be drunk, but he is not, not quite –

Enjolras reaches for him again, a soundless question in his throat, and Grantaire shakes him off just as abruptly, wondering for a moment if there is anyone watching from the doors of the Musain, if there is anything to see in this stretch of cold, hard pavement, still damp from the earlier rain. It seems unfair that two different places might bear the same name that haunts him still, in nightmares and daytime both, even if one is lost and the second unapologetically cheerful. His own voice is barely more than a growl.

“Do not touch me,” he says, and at last Enjolras backs off, staring at him like he’s afraid of Grantaire, despite all the vicious and unkind things they’ve said to each other over the last couple of years. Grantaire concludes this cannot be true. Last time he checked, Enjolras was not afraid of anything.

“I just wanted to see if you were all right,” he says quietly, in the tone of voice Grantaire feels he has no right to use. Enjolras does not need to be gentle, not in front of him. They are each bad medicines for the other and they cannot co-exist peacefully, for one will always let the other down. It frustrates him down to his very soul that Enjolras cannot see this.

“I’m fine,” he says, and folds his arms, because he needs some kind of defence against the force that is Enjolras, even if the force itself is temporarily kind – the more human version of the man, who chooses to put his friends before ideals, the one that Grantaire would admit to loving quite a bit if he wasn’t trying to spare himself the pain. “I don’t need you running after me just because we fought. We argue about something every meeting. Surely you’ve gotten used to it by now.”

“If you think I can’t tell the difference –” Enjolras begins hotly, but he cuts himself off just as quickly and hangs his head, fists clenched by his sides, and for a moment Grantaire honestly doesn’t know if his righteous anger is better directed at himself or some poor sod in the street. He pulls himself up, breathing in. “I’m sorry for being short with you. I really didn’t mean to be.”

And this – this is the point they always end up at, isn’t it? One will apologise to the other, more often than not because someone bullied them into it, and equally more often than not, that person is Grantaire. His harsh words first. His apology. His subsequent disappearance.

His friends operate often as his guilty conscience but it’s not unusual for Combeferre to get into Enjolras’ head like this too, making him say sorry even if he hasn’t changed his mind. Grantaire knows he never will. He holds more tightly to his ideals than Grantaire has even seen: more than a lesser man (him, always him) might cling to alcohol, more than a drowning sailor might cling to the last piece of his vessel. More than any person in times like these has a right to cling on to anything at all. Grantaire would tell him it’s indecent, but that would just start another argument.

Only occasionally does Enjolras put his friends first, and Grantaire is not one of those. So it’s safe enough to assume that this apology is a fake one, and he can brush on past it without ever pretending it mattered.

“Save it for those who believe it, Enjolras,” he spits, whilst guiltily savouring the taste of his name in Grantaire’s mouth. He wants – he doesn’t quite know what he wants, actually. Certainly not sympathy or pity, but perhaps just to curl up on the ground and stay there, until everyone in the world leaves him alone.

“I would like you to,” Enjolras says, the usual anger growing up around his words, like grass trapped in the pavement. Grantaire can see him trying to rid himself of it, but it sticks like burrs in his throat, and makes them both redder still. Every attempt at calm and collected speech is reserved for the podium, Grantaire thinks bitterly, not for him. “Please, Grantaire. I know you’re cross at me, and rightly so, but I don’t want to end it like –”

“I am clearly unhelpful,” Grantaire interrupts. “And you clearly don’t want me around. So why even bother to run after me and try to convince me otherwise? Apart from your reputation, of course, and what your friends think of you. Why bother at all?”

“If people think badly of me it will be because I deserved it,” Enjolras says fiercely, heat flashing behind his cool white-blue eyes. “I know I deserve your anger too, but you could at least hear me out.”

“I think we’ve called each other enough names for tonight, don’t you?”

“I’m not far off adding idiot to the list,” Enjolras says through a clenched jaw, “If you don’t think you and I are friends.”

Grantaire barks a laugh. “I’ve seen enemies with better dispositions than us,” he replies. “More politicians than you can ever count shaking hands with people they despise, and you and I can’t even manage that. So, to answer your question, no. No, we’re obviously not friends. Though I’d be delighted to know what gave you the impression.”

“Why come to the meetings?” Enjolras asks instead, and he isn’t pretending to be calm anymore, which Grantaire is sort of perversely grateful for. “Why bother to talk to me at all, if you think all we can do is argue? You’ve made some very good contributions to the group, you can’t think everything I say is bullshit.”

Grantaire opens his mouth to issue a retort, stops. He doesn’t know how to say _I have watched you die_ any more than _I don’t know how to stay away from you_. Both statements would hurt equally, and have the same amount of truth to them. Instead, Grantaire gives an angry shrug of his shoulders and turns away.

“You wouldn’t understand,” he says quietly, all the bravado of before suddenly gone, swirling like water down a drain. “I wouldn’t expect you to know how to put people first, instead of those principles of yours. Perhaps I hang around for fear that if I turn my back you’ll start using everyone like chess pieces. Even those who share your beliefs aren’t yours to do with as you wish, Enjolras.”

A long, desperate moment of silence. Even with the sky dark, Grantaire can see banks of grey cloud moving in from the east, eager to smother the stars. It will rain again soon, and that brings him no more joy than the feeble fire in Enjolras’ eyes peaking and dying, washed away like so much blood on stone and chairs barricaded against the door, taken by the next flood.

“I know that,” Enjolras says, with equal quietness, and there is a change in his tone that Grantaire does not know how to interpret, until he adds, “I have learnt some things, you know, from what we did.”

A single drop of rain falls down from somewhere above, falling onto the back of Grantaire’s neck before sliding down into his collar, making him shudder. The smell of iron in his nostrils is so much stronger than before, almost overpowering him, when Enjolras places a hand on his arm.

It is something of a mercy, he thinks as their eyes meet, that he does not dare to link his fingers with his.

“You are extremely drunk,” Enjolras says, looking up at him, the drops of rain falling down around them in earnest now, beading on Enjolras’ jumper like so many small dragonflies. The only thing lighting up his eyes is the street lamp just down the road, and even that light is foggy, the electric bulb impersonal and cold, blurred by the increased drops that patter down all around them. A whole world clustered in blue shadows that he cannot fight, or even push away. Grantaire feels something of his strength crumble, moves back to lean against the nearest wall, but Enjolras grips his arm still tighter and does not let go.

“Are you really so afraid that I would make the same mistake twice?” he asks, more anxiously now, and Grantaire has to close his eyes against the sudden, newer scent of flowers, heady and sickly sweet as lilies. It’s an overreaction, of course – he knows the scent of something as innocuous as Enjolras’ shampoo should not knock him senseless, nor the airy smell of washing powder coming from his jumper, but he can’t help it. For the first time since standing within a foot of him, Enjolras does not reek of the blood he has tried to spend the better third of his life forgetting.

“I did,” he mutters, leaning out of Enjolras’ grip, only to stumble and be caught again, by hands that remain unchanged despite two centuries past. “I fell for you again, which was an utterly ridiculous mistake that you can trust I won’t be making next time around.”

“If there is one,” Enjolras counters, but he’s looking into Grantaire’s face now much less with anger and instead a kind of quiet unhappiness he cannot quite translate. “I am sorry for berating you in all the rest. I could have spent my time much better.”

“Doing what, exactly?”

“Being kind to you.”

A proper drizzle now, surrounding them on all sides, but Grantaire’s tired, drunken mind is too fatigued to process that; he slides down onto the pavement, not even noticing as Enjolras sits down beside him, his body tucked carefully up against his to make sure he does not fall. Despite the cold and the damp he does not think himself incapable of passing out right now, or Enjolras leaving him alone to die in the rain.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Enjolras admonishes, and Grantaire realises too late that he said the last part out loud. Enjolras doesn’t pull himself up, however, just … continues to sit there. As if Grantaire were a tolerable human being worth spending time with, and not whatever he is now. An expert at riling Enjolras, that’s true, but little else. A failed artist and an even worst friend, to Éponine and many others. He barely feels Enjolras wrap his arm around him until it has already happened.

“The others don’t remember,” he says into the blue-tinged silence, thick with the scent of ordinary things, but not with blood. “Just in case you were wondering.”

“I wasn’t,” Grantaire answers wearily. He expects Enjolras to frown at him, and is relieved when he does, though that face too is difficult to make out through the haze of drunkenness, too many cruel words said. It is a wry twist of the mouth that is not quite happy, nor sad. Eventually he decides it’s not worth bothering about and simply slumps back against Enjolras, idly wondering what it would be like to die again, but peaceful and unafraid. The moment doesn’t last.

“If you want to talk about it, you can,” Enjolras says again, trying to prompt him into conversation, but Grantaire must manage to give him a look that conveys something of his weariness, because he doesn’t try again until Grantaire coughs, deep and low in his throat.

“Why the hell do you want me in your life, exactly?”

“I didn’t get to, last time. I was hoping that maybe this time we would come to an agreement – not that I knew you knew,” he adds, with something of a very small smile. It fades quickly. “We’ve been at each other’s throats for so long and I didn’t – I didn’t realise you would still be angry at me. Things are different, now.”

“For you, maybe. Not for me.”

“We’re both alive,” Enjolras points out with not a little fierceness. “And the world is moving forwards, though slowly. Not without people fighting for it to be that way, or without resistance, but.”

He pauses, glancing sideways at Grantaire, now leaning fully into him and regretting every choice he’s ever made in his life. “I would appreciate it if you gave me another chance.”

Grantaire scoffs. “At being kind?”

“No. At loving you.”

Grantaire turns a bleary-eyed gaze upon him, unable to figure out if he’s serious, until he sees Enjolras’ face. “But that’s ridiculous,” he protests. “You don’t have time.”

A real smile, then. “I would like to make time,” Enjolras says firmly. “If you’ll allow it. And if not that, then – then less yelling at each other, because I don’t actually enjoy it.”

His brain is too slow for thinking, Grantaire decides. The pavement they’re sitting on is much too wet. So instead he simply nods. “Saving your pretty voice. I understand.”

Enjolras sighs in frustration. “Grantaire –”

“What? I’m drunk. Leave me alone.”

“No, I won’t,” Enjolras says, with firmness equal to before. He moves to stand, pulling Grantaire with him, and levels that gaze upon him again. Oh, he thinks helplessly, those eyes have always been the same. “I have decided that I love you. You can decide for yourself after we go to a museum or something, and we can get coffee.”

Soap and shampoo and clean wool drenched in rain. Grantaire breathes in deep, tucking his head close to Enjolras’ neck, and is only half-surprised when he doesn’t move away.

“That makes no sense,” he mumbles into the fabric. “But all right. I’ll deal.”

**Author's Note:**

> ty for reading! pls leave kudos or a comment if you enjoyed, really makes my day :)
> 
> my other les mis fic, simple twist of fate, is on hiatus for now but i promise i'm working on it in between writing original fiction. things are just a little busy right now but i am planning on updating eventually. keep safe and take care of yourselves wherever you are <3


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